


The Clothes That Bind

by leiascully



Category: Leverage
Genre: Clothes are difficult, Crushes, Gen, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Pre-OT3, Teamwork, Undressing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27085582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: Parker gets stuck in her sports bra, and Hardison and Eliot have to help her.
Comments: 24
Kudos: 75





	The Clothes That Bind

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: S3ish  
> A/N: Is this fic absolutely based on the many times I've almost gotten stuck in my sweaty sports bra? Yes. Many thanks to my wife coffeesuperhero for helping me out yesterday and thereby saving me from having to ruin a perfectly useful sports bra by cutting it off, and also for lending me some of the best lines.

"Hardison."

Hardison looked up and tried to keep his jaw from dropping. Parker was standing in front of his computer, in her tight black crime leggings and a sports bra and nothing else. 

"Uh, yeah," he said. "You, uh, need something?"

"I guess I got really sweaty in that vent," she said, twisting her body to hook her fingers under the edge of her sports bra. "Now I can't get this stupid bra off."

"You need help taking your bra off?" Hardison repeated. His brain had kind of shorted out.

"Yeah," she said, wriggling her shoulders. "It's too tight. It's fine when I put it on, but sometimes it gets stuck. Good for vents. Bad for anything else."

"Are you sure you need me?" Hardison asked. "I mean, wouldn't Sophie be better at it?"

"Sophie isn't back yet," Parker said. She squirmed, struggling to tug the bra over her head. She hopped up and down. The sports bra, to Hardison's profound relief and disappointment, didn't budge. "Also, I don't think Sophie works out. Sports bras aren't really her thing." 

"Damn, woman, they're not my thing either." Hardison got up from the tall chair where he'd been going through his post-job rituals, making sure everything that needed to be erased had been. "What, um, what kind of help do you need?"

"Just pull on it," she said, demonstrating, and once again, it didn't budge at all. Hardison approached her warily, but Parker didn't move at all, not even when he worked his fingers under the seams of the bra. Her skin was soft and damp. He tried not to be into the whole thing, especially considering his hands were in her armpits, but sweaty Parker so far smelled more wild than anything else, and he would be lying if he said he wasn't intrigued. 

"Ready?" she said.

"Yeah," he said.

"You might want to lean back a little," she told him, and he tipped his head away as she started hopping up and down again. Hardison's hands slipped and the band of the bra snapped away from his fingers.

"Oops," he said. 

"Try again," Parker said, and this time he kept hold of the surprisingly slippery fabric, but the bra still didn't budge much, definitely not enough to work it off over Parker's head.

"Thanks anyway," Parker said. "Maybe Eliot can help me."

"Yeah, I bet he's taken off lots of bras," Hardison said before he could stop himself. "Push comes to shove, he'll cut it off you."

"Nah," Parker said, and then thought about it. "Well. Maybe. But he never has before."

"Before? When before?" Hardison asked. "Has Eliot been taking your clothes off?"

Parker looked sideways at him. "Eliot and I take our clothes off together all the time. We have a lot of costume changes."

Hardison relaxed, but only a little. "Right. Costume changes." He tried not to think about Parker and Eliot crammed into elevators and locker rooms and the back seats of cars, ripping their clothes off with abandon. At least, he wasn't going to think about it right then. 

"Eliot!" Parker hollered.

"What?" Eliot stuck his head in. He hadn't changed yet either. He was still all mussed and dusty from the basement where he'd taken down the security guys, his hair curling from the water that he'd been splashed with when one of the guards had tried pulling the fire alarm and the sprinklers had gone off. 

"I can't get my sports bra off," Parker told him.

Eliot looked between them. "Hardison will help you." His eye shivered in the hint of a wink. Hardison nodded back. Eliot was a man who respected a crush. They had each other's backs. 

"He tried," Parker said. She looked at Eliot and then at Hardison. "Maybe I need both of you."

"If this is anything like that time in Vancouver, couldn't hurt," Eliot said. 

"I remember Vancouver," Hardison said. "I do not know why you two would have been taking off each other's clothes in Vancouver."

"Don't worry about it," Eliot said. Hardison frowned at him. "It was nothing. Literally just a helping hand."

"The zipper on my dress broke," Parker said. "Eliot fixed it. Well. Eliot ripped it, but at least it came off." 

"I know my way around a seam," Eliot said smugly. "Dated a lot of models, you know." 

"We know," Hardison said.

"I didn't think models got stuck in their clothes," Parker said. She positioned herself between them, reaching out and tugging them closer when they weren't as close as she liked. 

"You'd be surprised," Eliot said. "Some of those sample garments aren't put together as well as you'd think. I mean, they're only made to be worn a couple of times." Hardison wedged his fingers under the seams again. Eliot put his arms under Hardison's and gripped the front and back of the difficult bra. They jostled briefly for position. Parker raised her arms over her head and waited.

Hardison blinked exaggeratedly at Eliot, a clear hint for him to close his eyes. Eliot frowned. Hardison made a face at him over Parker's head. Eliot rolled his eyes and then closed them, looking away. Hardison turned his head too, watching Parker through his lashes. He'd close his eyes if the thing came off. Of course he would. He was a gentleman.

"Ready?" Parker said.

"Yeah," Hardison said, and Eliot said, "Yep," and Parker hopped and wiggled.

"Is it working?" Hardison asked.

"Almost!" Parker gasped, and she shimmied her shoulders and jumped around a little more and suddenly Hardison felt the sports bra give a little. He yanked and Eliot hauled and together they wrestled it up over the swell of Parker's breasts, over the hard knobs of her shoulders, and over her head. Which was, of course, when Sophie walked in, followed by Nate.

"Oh my," Sophie said. "Should we come back later?"

Hardison and Eliot let go of the bra. Parker caught it and turned, holding it over her breasts with a carelessness that made Hardison want to drape his scarf around her. 

"Why would you come back later?" she asked.

"You seem, ah, busy," Sophie said. Nate had turned and was looking determinedly at the wall. 

"She got, um, stuck," Hardison told them. Nobody seemed to be able to get through a whole sentence except Parker and Eliot. Unflappable, that's what they were. "We were helping her...get unstuck."

"Naturally," Nate said, still not looking. Hardison glanced at Eliot and they both stepped in front of Parker. 

"I'm good now," Parker said cheerfully. "Eliot didn't have to cut any of my clothes off this time." 

"Not gonna ask," Sophie said under her breath, and turned on her heel. She pushed Nate in front of her. "Looks like you've got everything taken care of here, so we'll just run out and pick up dinner. Thai okay with everyone? Excellent."

"Okay!" Parker said. "Ooh! Don't forget the spring rolls!"

"We won't!" Sophie called over her shoulder.

"Do you want to put some clothes on?" Eliot asked Parker without looking. "You know, like a regular person?"

"Hardison doesn't mind," Parker said in a dismissive voice, but when Eliot pulled off his henley and handed it to her, they could feel that she put it on. Hardison pointedly didn't look at Parker, but he did glance at Eliot, and Eliot's thin undershirt didn't hide any of his chest either, which at least served the purpose of distracting Hardison from thinking about Parker half-naked behind them. The fact that the contours of Eliot's chest were fascinating wasn't exactly new information, but it was definitely something Hardison was going to have to think about, some other time, when he was extremely alone. And how long did it take to put on a damn shirt anyway?

"All better," Parker said, and they turned to look at her again. Hardison tried not to think about the fact that her breasts were just loose under the soft fabric of Eliot's shirt that was already warm from Eliot's body. He tried really hard not to think about it. He was definitely not thinking about it at all, not even a little, even though Eliot's shirt fit Parker very differently and what was just unbuttoned on Eliot was extremely unbuttoned on Parker's non-Eliot chest. Parker pretended to twang the sports bra at them like a rubber band. 

"Maybe you should get rid of that one," Eliot suggested. "Since it's such a problem."

Parker shrugged. "It's good for vents."

"I guess that's all there is to it," Eliot said, rolling his eyes. 

"You keep those jeans even though they made you slip on that ramp like five times when we were stealing that painting back from those people on that yacht," Parker pointed out.

"Dammit, Parker, my pants are a tactical decision," Eliot growled.

"Yeah, bell bottoms are really crucial fighting attire," Hardison said. 

"They're not bell bottoms," Eliot said hotly. "I gotta be free to move." He shifted his weight in demonstration. 

Parker slung her arms around them. The offending sports bra dangled over Hardison's shoulder. "Hey," she said brightly. "We all have our superstitions. If Eliot's is his pants, that's okay."

"I don't have any damn superstitions," Eliot said.

Parker ignored him. "The important thing is that we all made a lot of money and we're about to eat a lot of curry and spring rolls." She patted each of them on the head. "Thanks for the help." She bounced away, off on some new Parker-mission, hopefully to shower and get dressed in actual clothes. They watched her go. Hardison shook his head slowly. Eliot clapped him on the shoulder.

"It's gonna be okay, man," he said. 

"Maybe so," Hardison said. 

"It will be," Eliot said, and walked off. Hardison watched him go. The muscles in Eliot's back flexed as he moved, and damn, he looked so strong. And firm. And warm. Hardison scrubbed his hands over his face. 

"This is fine," he said to himself. "It's gonna be okay." And maybe one day it would be. In the meantime, at least he was about to have spring rolls.

**Author's Note:**

> Pro-tip: Buy the sports bras with zippers. Better they slip and you have to re-zip than you almost get stuck in it when nobody else is home and you are just jumping up and down in your bathroom getting progressively more stuck. Ask me how I know.


End file.
